by James Beltran
Staff Writer
For the Houston Cougars offense, keeping up with the amount of runs given up by their pitching staff was like walking through a pool of drying cement. It was vigorous and, in the end, impossible.
In all three games against Alabama Birmingham, Houston fell behind early. In Friday's game, the UAB Blazers took a 5-1 lead in the top of the fifth inning. In Saturday's game, the Cougars again were at a disadvantage, trailing 4-0 through the first inning and a half.
Another early deficit led to Sunday's loss, after Houston starter Scott McLeod allowed five runs in his one and two-thirds inning of work.
"We need to go back to what got us here," McLeod said. "I know I didn't have my best stuff. Our pitchers have to start hitting their spots again."
The offense, similar to the first two games of the series, was able to get McLeod off the hook for the loss. The Cougar bats battled back to a 6-6 tie in the seventh, only to have the bullpen give the game away with seven UAB runs in the eighth and ninth innings.
Dustin Carr, who reached base three times on Sunday, said it is frustrating to score so many runs in a series (25) and only come up with one win.
"It's disappointing when you fight, and they come right back and get those runs," Carr said.
But he thinks the offense can still do more to win the high-scoring games. He said, "We're hitting the ball well right now, but we're still not hitting it as well as we were at the beginning of the season."
"I think offensively this weekend we did a pretty good job," said Houston coach Rayner Noble, "especially considering the pitching was not good."
Despite Carr's comments, the Cougars offensive showing over the weekend was impressive and should have won them at least two of the games. Instead Houston lost the series, and now finds itself looking up to the Tulane Green Wave in the Conference USA standings.
Noble said he is not happy with the performance dealt out by his pitching staff. "This is the worst we've pitched the ball all season," he said. "We were awful."
Cougars starters only pitched 10 innings in the three games, allowing 17 runs. The bullpen was not much better, as they added to the burden upon the Houston bats with their 13 runs.
With the constant blunders of the pitching staff, there may be some minor changes in the use of certain players for their last C-USA series next week. Noble said, "(Jerret) Sykes threw pretty good today. He may be getting a start against Cincinnati."
Noble added that if the pitching does not improve, his team has no chance to catch the Green Wave for the conference title.
"We're not going anywhere if our pitching continues like they did today," he said.